Five D&D map making programs you've (probably) never tried

I tested out five more battl mat makers to find out which one is the easiest including two that come with cyber Punk and medieval Assets buil in and one that has a completely unique workflow unlike any other mat maker I've tried but first I want to tell you that this video is sponsored by improved initiative it was the fastest I've ever said yes to a sponsorship because I already use and love it but more on that later welcome to the table I'm Kelly and we're going to make some very rushed battle maps again I've said it before but in my prep I try to make things as easy and quick as possible so that I can spend more time thinking about the stories in my campaigns there are so many incredibly talented and creative map makers out there so if I'm going to make my own Maps the process has to be really fun and easy otherwise I might as well just use pre-made Maps that's why this comparison focuses on speed and ease of use I gave myself 30 minutes to get familiar with each map maker and then 10 minutes to make a map and because this is for ttrpgs I made myself some roll tables to determine exactly what I needed to make and thank you to Paladin roleplaying for sending me these dice I used the metal D6 set to to roll on the tables for this video and they feel very nice now this is by no means an exhaustive review it's more intended to introduce you to map makers that you might not be familiar with so you can explore each of them further on your own all of these tools are capable of creating fantastic Maps if you put in the time to get to know them each of these map makers have a showcase page and there are some incredible examples of what can be done with them but I want to find out which is the easiest to pick up and get started with so I can start creating good-looking maps without having to invest too much time first up is a mostly free map maker that Prides itself on Simplicity and ease of use but once I dug into it a bit I was really surprised at how in-depth and capable it was it says it right on the homepage old school dungeon Maps Made Easy and today we are going to use it to make very much not that 2 1 an urban setting with a house on the sea dungeon scroll excels at simple printer friendly old school style dungeon maps and we're going going to use it for something that it is completely not designed for great dungeon scroll is a browser based map maker that has all the core features available for free and a pro tier which is $7 per month they were just recently acquired by roll 20 but according to posts by both companies nothing will change except that there will be better integration of dungeon scroll into roll 20 the free tools contain everything you need to make some really cool maps we'll just use the wall tool to kind of fill this in on the surface dungeon scroll is just an old school dungeon map maker but once you dive into it it actually contains all the tools you need to make pretty much any kind of map the ability to add different layers means you have a lot of flexibility for mixing the different styles available you can go in and tweak all the settings within the pre-made Styles as well and the built-in assets allow you to add some nice finishing touches you can also upload your own assets to truly make whatever type of map you want some nice bay windows actually a fancy house if you're using dungeon scroll as it's intended to make old school dungeon Maps then I have no notes it's fantastic it's not really fair to critique it based on what I was using it for but I'm going to do it anyway the thing I struggled with most while using it was if you aren't making dungeon Maps or extremely simple Maps then you have to get creative with workarounds which can be timec consuming this is a great cobblestone street just turn off the walls not having a brush tool was the source of a lot of my problems the hatching options are so cool I just wish you could brush them onto a layer without having them connected to a wall my favorite thing about dungeon scroll is its clean and unintimidating UI this is the only map maker in this video that I jumped straight into using without watching any tutorials I did end up watching a couple of videos for ideas on using it in more advanced ways but the majority of my learning was done just by playing around and I love that how accessible it is is another huge strength it's available in your browser so there's no need to install anything and you don't even have to make an account to start using it finally the passionate community and developer behind it are great they have an extremely active Discord where you can get all kinds of inspiration and the developer is constantly adding new features and improvements all right I mean it's pretty basic but for 10 minutes using it completely not what it's designed for um I to say it's pretty good this next one was the most requested mmaker from my last video 3 2 okay grassland Church Pond tail Spire speed is not a strong suit it could really cool but it's not fast um all right let's see what I can do in 10 minutes tail Spire is a 3D mapmaker and VT that came out in April 20120 it has been used extensively on Dimension 20 and it has over 3,000 reviews on Steam it aims to replicate the feeling of physical terrain pieces in minis by using a block-based approach similar to the terrain sets from companies like Dwarven Forge this block-based approach definitely sets it apart from the other map makers and definitely makes it feel closer to building with physical terrain this approach makes it both easier and harder to use even though the interface is fairly simple I started with a tutorial right away it's pretty much impossible to use without knowing the shortcut keys so starting with a tutorial to learn those is a must luckily there are tons of great ones out there I watched this tutorial by a staly Astra and I learned a ton compared to using terrain wall and portal tools in the other programs placing blocks in tail Spire is quite slow all right this is going to be a pretty small church just like a little mini church and going into this I didn't think I stood a chance of building a map in 10 minutes but after I finished my 30-minute intro with two short tutorials under my belt I was feeling pretty confident got for furniture pews how do you how do you spell pew oh bench there is something extremely satisfying about browsing through and placing the blocks the art style makes them look like little physical pieces which just makes me want to collect them all it's a good thing there aren't any microtransactions in here otherwise I'd be very poor speaking of which tail Spire has a one-time purchase price of $25 and it's available on Steam for both PC and Mac so far all of the content packs have been free and a new one comes out every month oh no oh no the benches are floating okay uh oh god oh no this has gone terribly wrong it works best if everyone at your table has a copy of tail Spire then everyone can move their own minis measure distances and zone out looking at all the fun details in the maps that being said you absolutely can use tail Spire for your group with just one copy if you play in person and run a player view screen at your table you can just move the camera and minis around for your players if you play online you can share your screen in Discord or whatever you use and move the pieces around for those that don't have a copy of the program they have altars oh that is pretty intense this is a pretty intense Church okay it's kind of like a death Shrine oh yeah is for the blood I think that's where the where the blood goes oh boy all right well you know whatever initially I struggled with the UI and shortcuts but after spending a bit of time with it and watching a tutorial I felt comfortable although I could see it being intimidated and frustrating to try to learn without the use of any tutorials the next potential downside is that you are stuck with the blocky style that this produces if you don't like the look of emulated physical terrain blocks then this isn't for you currently there isn't a native way to import your own assets there are some workarounds using mods but it definitely isn't a core feature yet this means that you're pretty much stuck using the included assets but that does lead me directly into what I think is one of tail spire's biggest strengths and that is asset availability there are a staggering number of tiles and asset asss in there for several different genres there are medieval assets modern assets and sci-fi SL cyberpunk assets there are currently 280 Minis and 2100 tiles and objects with more being added every month there's also Hero Forge integration so you can make your own Minis and easily bring them in the second major strength is the community generally tail Spire has been very well received and a passionate Community has been built around it which means there are a ton of community-made maps available to use after a recent update it's now Poss possible to share and search for maps directly in talespire there are also large repositories of maps on taals Tavern and tals Bazaar the third major strength of tail Spire is that I just found it really fun now that's obviously very subjective but it brought me back to the days of building Lego and playing with armymen and Matchbox cars and all those little Fantastical scenarios I used to make okay well honestly I'm pretty surprised at how well that went um tail Spire is not quick uh but I mean I made a basic battle map in 10 minutes so I guess it's kind of quick this next program was also fun to use and it has a unique feature that I haven't seen in other map makers have you ever built a map for a campaign then started a new campaign in a different genre and wanted to reuse that map or perhaps found a map online that's made for medieval fantasy but you play cyberpunk what if you could just change the genre of a map with a button click well Kronos Builder seeks to solve that problem but first no matter which of these map makers you use you're going to need an initiative tracker to actually run your combat which is why I want to tell you about the sponsor of today's video the free and truly excellent initiative tracker improved initiative improved initiative is called an initiative tracker but it does so much more it has without exaggeration doubled the speed of my combat which means my players spend less time waiting around between their turns and more time actually getting to play while I tell you about the rest of my favorite features I'm going to do a side-by-side comparison of manually setting up an when running a round of combat and running it through improved initiative setting up an encounter is quick and easy you can save all of your player characters with different folders for different campaigns improved initiative comes pre-loaded with all the SRD content and you can add in any other content that you own either manually or through bulk import all the core features are free but if you sign up for the patreon you can make sure all of your manually added content is backed up and available on any device that you sign into you can also get access to the D and Beyond importer so you can easily import any content you own straight from D and D beyond having the monster stat blocks available right in the initiative order is by far my favorite feature I used to have a tab open for every stat block and clicking through all of them to find the monster I was looking for was timec consuming now all the stap blocks are available right from the initiative and I can even roll directly in improved initiative by clicking on any stat head to the link down in the description to start using improved initiative and make combat easier on yourself all right now let's get to Kronos Builder 3 2 okay a desert guard Tower with some pools of water around desert guard Tower pools all right good stuff good stuff all right great start definitely could have just use the bucket tool oops coros Builder was released on Steam in December of 2022 cost $45 and is available for Windows and Mac it's a 3D map maker for sci-fi cyberpunk Victorian Eastern and medieval settings this definitely sets it apart from the plethora of map makers that are only geared towards medieval D andd settings Kronos Builder has only 29 reviews on Steam and they are mixed One reviewer wrote that they think the game should have been released under Early Access and I would have to agree it was released as a finished product last year but has since received a ton of updates and improvements that have made it much more usable I found the UI in this one a little frustrating so getting started with a tutorial is a must although there have been significant UI changes since launch so I wasn't able to find a tutorial with with the latest UI and features despite some bugs Kronos Builder is absolutely usable and has come a long way in a short period of time the developers are very active and there have been a constant stream of patches and updates since the launch they just launched version two of Kronos Builder and the core features including multi-level Maps came as a free update the new content packs are available as DLC for purchase we can make it multiple floors which is very cool okay let's go up one level and just going to do the same thing again oh what happened there the thing I struggled with most while using Kronos Builder was the UI and although it is a massive improvement over the original UI it wasn't naturally intuitive to me and there weren't enough obvious tool tips or helpers stairs how do we do stairs oh [Music] boy I think Kronos Builder would benefit from an in-depth tutorial series made by the developers the autobuilder tools didn't feel as polished as some other map makers I've tried and the object placement felt a little bit random the door is over here okay that's not great the terrain tools were pretty good but they were very much tied to the grid which left some blocky and unnatural looking terrain changes that felt out of place now for the strengths and Kronos Builder definitely does have its strengths the nature paintbrush is excellent that's great just a desert paintbrush that's very good if you play sci-fi or cyberpunk games then this is a great option there are very few 3D map makers out there that come with sci-fi and cyberpunk assets so this is really where Kronos builder sets itself apart they are also constantly adding more genres like the recently released Norse assets and Western assets are coming next these will come at a cost though being able to change out a map Style with the click of a button is very cool it didn't always work but when it did it was very cool I for these guards to sleep in this guard Tower they also can't get upstairs but that's okay one bed you guys can share I'm sure they'll continue to improve the auto Builder and the Chronos button functionality which will make this a truly great option the third strength which is thanks to a fairly recent update is the ability to share and download Community Maps directly within the program the community is fairly small at the moment but having this feature built in early on is great to see overall Kronos Builder is very promising and it's come a long way in a year I know that they'll continue to develop and improve it and I'm looking forward to seeing where it's at in another year not bad this is a guard Tower two floors in the desert with some pools of water just some nice nice natural feature I do like being able to make a two- floor map or more you can just keep on going up and up and up which is cool so you could build terrain elements do like that the map maker with the most unique workflow that I've ever experienced is still to come but first is a map maker that was built with a very specific spefic play scenario in mind and has a surprising number of features outside of just making Maps this is the only map maker in this video that I did not pay for Nathan the developer sent me a copy of the program but there was no obligation to make a video 1 go okay a forest Hideout stream hideout in a forest with a stream Aran Forge released their public Alpha in 2018 and the program is available from their website with either their fantasy starter pack or their sci-fi starter pack for $35 just like the rest of these programs Aran Forge is developed by a small team of passionate ttrpg players it does set itself apart from the pack in a couple of ways though it was developed with sci-fi and medieval fantasy content right from the start and it was specifically developed for groups playing in person using a screen for battle maps at its core aren Forge is a really solid 2D animated battle map maker you can make curved walls which is kind of cool so maybe these are some boat logs but it also has a whole vtt system designed for running in-person games using a screen including touchscreen support if you're lucky enough to have a D and D table with a built-in touchscreen it also has built-in dice rolling initiative tracking and not taking capabilities but I didn't use any of those I just used the map maker my experience started off a little bumpy with some issues with the launcher I installed it on both my PC and my Mac and had issues with both it kept saying that there were errors and that it sent logs to the devs even though I just opened it for the first time and I hadn't touched anything I then tried to install the mat maker or the toolkit as they call it and the essentials pack it said it was installing but there weren't any progress bars and nothing was happening I restarted the program a couple of times and then it installed and updated correctly luckily you only have to go through that process one time once the program was installed I didn't have any issues the UI wasn't immediately intuitive and I know I've said that for all of these except for Dungeon scroll but as soon as tools are inside submenus it's not immediately obvious how everything works luckily Aram Forge has produced a really excellent and detailed tutorial series on how to use the program including basic and advanced use cases I was able to skim through a bunch of these in my 30 minute time of the program and learn some more Advanced Techniques like the layer blending that's something that I definitely would not have figured out on my own I'll layer on two textures over top of each other Layer Two textures to kind of give it some more variation the window and door tool doesn't break up a wall automatically like it does in some other map makers but the fact that you can split walls at any point was a great compromise there are a ton of different tools including the ability to add round or Bode walls scatter object tools automatic lighting and customization of assets right in the program all right five minutes let's see here they got they got a floor they got a floor in there there's a hideout but you know it's a nice Hideout these are some fancy Bandits the essentials asset pack felt like it had lots of textures and objects in it but there are other packs available for purchase in their Marketplace you can also easily add your own assets the thing I struggled with most was the terrain blending although the texture layering was cool and it allowed you to blend different textures I wish there was some more automatic blending between different ground textures I'd also love to see some automatic blending between the ground and water textures some of the other map makers I've tried blend between water and land and between ground textures automatically which allows you to get nicer looking terrain with little effort and they just have straight up a fire inside oh actually this is a nice fireplace no that's too nice they just straight up they straight up have a campfire o look at that okay oh my God 3 minutes Aran forge's strengths are the in-depth tutorials made by the developer the amount of in-depth object customization and the animated assets all right well the animations are really cool and that has everything that's Forest Hideout trees Forest Hideout kind of Log Cabin thing and uh stream there's no Bridge so you just kind of got to Wade through it but hey it's a 10-minute map so it's not bad the last map maker in this video certainly feels the most unique because of its workflow and UI and after spending this time with it I'm still not sure whether I actually like it but I'm definitely intrigued by it 2 one all right a forest again with a shop and a stream Dragon map maker is available on Steam for $35 it's still in Early Access with a planned release in 2023 but 2023 is quickly coming to an end so we'll see if that happens Dragon map maker is kind of a hybrid between a 2d and a 3D application which means that it functions almost unlike anything I've used and then another door inside I'll just do default door who we trying to impress many of the applications I've used feel like they rely on the Shand that you learn from using programs like Photoshop in 2D or something like blender or Unreal Engine in 3D but the way you do things in this program feels completely different unlike anything I've used before and it really hurt my brain at first for example I'm used to scrolling through a library of walls and then placing or drawing those wall pieces but in Dragon mat maker you select a layer draw some generic walls and then apply what they call a theme to those walls to make them look a certain way this forces you to break down the map making process into different steps and do each one separately first the general layout then the terrain then figuring out what the buildings look like and then adding detail after watching a few tutorials this all started to click and again the developers have made some really excellent and in-depth tutorials that explained everything just as a side note every developer should make a tutorial series on how to use their software it makes such a huge difference in picking up a new piece of software and it allows you to learn so much faster if the person who built it can just explain it to you okay got to add a water plane who okay kind of like the ocean but all right whatever go with this after my 30 minutes of getting to know the program I did feel comfortable with it and the flexibility of this workflow became quite apparent being able to easily change the stylings of rooms or other features at will is a really neat concept for example you can put all of your bedrooms on one layer and then change the appearance of all of them at once you can also get very detailed with the customization of all the assets right down to the color of the door knobs right now the amount of themes and assets is limited but it's growing with each update at this time you can't add your own assets but that is a planned feature the thing I struggled with most was the UI and the workflow everything is just very different from every other application that I've used right down to the camera movement in almost every other 3D application I've used you click and hold the mouse wheel and then move the mouse around to pan the camera in in Dragon mat maker you hold the space bar and then use the left and right Mouse buttons to move the camera they both work great but learning new habits was difficult at first that being said I only spent 30 minutes with the application and was already getting the hang of it so it really wouldn't be an issue long term okay this isn't really a stream that was my bad it's definitely the ocean but whatever the biggest strength of dragon M maker is the results It produced it was just hard to make a badl looking map the terrain materials look really nice and blend really well together and the terain elevation changes are nice and smooth all the assets look nice and the renders it produces look excellent the short amount of time that I spent with dragon mat maker definitely intrigued me and made me want to go back and explore it more all right well aside from it The Accidental ocean you know pretty good we don't have any furniture inside but I mean we do have furniture we have stuff got a lot of stuff got this uh antlers hanging in the window horn horns a lot of horns nice that's good yeah you know what 10 minutes a game pretty good there are a lot of great options in here but I think my two favorites from the last Maps video still hold up if you want to see five more battl map makers and which two have been my favorites so far you can watch this video here I appreciate you

Channel: Power Word Spill

Views: 67,698

Keywords: d&d, dungeons and dragons, dnd, dnd 5e, fifth edition, dm tips, dungeon master, d&d campaign, d&d 5e, 5th edition, ttrpg, tabletop gaming, DM, game master, GM, dungeons & dragons, how to play dungeons and dragons, wizards of the coast, how to, rpg, pathfinder, dungeon crawl classics, ose, tabletop roleyplaying, power word spill, level up your d&d night, d&d more fun, online dnd, online D&D, battle maps, dungeon scrawl, talespire, chronos builder, arkenforge, dragon map maker

Id: J0v3Q-iZuzY

Length: 23min 21sec (1401 seconds)

Published: Sun Dec 03 2023